The stories behind the buildings, statues and other points of interest that make Manhattan fascinating.

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

The 1888 Jackson Square Library -- No. 251 W. 13th Street

Unlike some privileged boys George Washington Vanderbilt was intrigued by books.When only 12 years old he began cataloguing each book he read.A series of small notebooks, entitled Books
I Have Read, recorded each title, numbered consecutively, along with the
author.His affection for reading and
books got him in trouble with his mothing, Maria Louise Kissam Vanderbilt that
same year.On May 27, 1875 he wrote in
his dairy

“I have been way down town today and have displeased Mother,
she gave me two dollars to buy a sketch book with which I went to four stores
but could not get one so I spent it on books, besides $2.65 of my own money
which Mother did not like…I got two volumes of the Young American Abroad.And the last volume of the Yacht Club.”

Vanderbilt kept his list current and when he died on March
6, 1914 at the age of 51 following an appendectomy, his last entry was No. 3159—Volume
III of Henry Adams’ “History of the United States.”George Vanderbilt was reading an average of
81 books a year at the time of his death.

Few New Yorkers had the money or leisure time that enabled George
Vanderbilt to pursue reading.The few libraries that existed prior to 1880 were not open to the
general public.But that year the Free
Circulating Library was incorporated.The
response was so great that the sidewalks around the first library—a single room
in a building on 13th Street near Fourth Avenue—were blocked.At closing time on one occasion, of the 500
books only two were left on the shelves.

George W. Vanderbilt - from the collection of the Library of Congress.

It was the sort of worthy project that caught the attention of
the bibliophile Vanderbilt and he decided to fund a branch of the Lending
Library in Greenwich Village, opposite Jackson Square.

In 1887 Vanderbilt was no stranger to Richard
Morris Hunt.Work was underway that year
on George’s stable on Staten Island and on the Vanderbilt Family Mausoleum,
both designed by Hunt.Ten years earlier the
esteemed architect had designed the massive William K. Vanderbilt chateau on Fifth
Avenue and within a year he would begin work on the palatial Marble House in
Newport, also for William.

George’s library would be less grandiose, but no less
enchanting.In 1887, two years before
Andrew Carnegie donated his first library in the United States; the first
bricks were laid for George Vanderbilt’s.There was no fanfare associated with the opening of the library on July
5, 1888.A small listing in the New-York
Tribune that day with the heading “What Is Going On To-Day” simply noted “Opening
new Vanderbilt Library, Jackson Square.”

New-York Tribune, March 24, 1901 (copyright expired)

The handsome new building was, nevertheless, an “ornament”
to the neighborhood.Unlike the frothy confections that
characterized some of the other Vanderbilt projects; the library was a take on a Flemish guildhall.It was a very early example of the architectural fad that would sweep
the city in the next decade recalling Manhattan’s Dutch roots.A red-tiled roof hid behind a curving Flemish
Renaissance gable and wrought iron strapwork decorated the red brick façade.Wrought iron numerals on the four piers,
just above the first floor, gave the date of construction: 1887.A touch of Gothic was introduced by the trefoil
decorations in the blind arches of the window openings.

Wrought iron numbers spell out the date of construction.

Vanderbilt’s completed gift to the city cost him $40,000—about
$900,000 in today’s dollars.By 1892
the Free Circulating Library consisted of four buildings, including
Vanderbilt’s.“The Memorial History of
the City of New-York” that year said “Wealthy citizens have contributed
generously to this admirable free library, and its benefit to the community at
large is evident from its circulation of nearly half a million of volumes in
1892.”

Old rowhouses still abut the library in this stereopticon view -- NYPL Collection

In 1899 the chief librarian, J. Norris Wing instituted a
innovation nearly unheard of in public libraries:the “Open Shelf” system. Until
now, the books were kept under the safeguard of librarians.The concept of allowing the public to run
free among the inventory of books was unheard of.But Wing insisted that “The only proper way
to manage a circulating library so as to avoid all unnecessary delay and
friction in the bringing together of book and reader, is to run it upon the
open-shelf system.”

The Children's Reading Room -- photo NYPL Collection

Until that year, readers looked over the library’s catalog
of books, noted the number of the volume he wanted, filled out a call slip and
waited until the librarian returned “after a weary search to inform him that
the book is out,” said The Sun.Under
Wing’s system, the reader simply wandered the shelves, chose his book and
checked it out.

The Sun was impressed.“From 1880, when the first branch was opened, up to about eighteen months
ago the public was excluded from the places where the books were kept, and when
the proposition was made to give the readers free access to all books in the
library many of the attendants shook their heads.”The experiment was tried with one branch,
then two, and by August 1899 all the libraries were on board.

Librarians were pleased--instead of running back and
forth all day with stacks of books they were giving recommendations and
advice.“Now we are fresh when our day’s
work is done,” said one.“Moreover, we
know that we can and do help the people who use the library to an extent not
one of us thought possible under the old system.Before we mostly only carried books; now we
advise about books.”

The newspaper pointed out the two drawbacks:wear and tear on the books and theft.Nevertheless, the advantages outweighed the
negatives.“I do not know how many books
were stolen elsewhere,” said one librarian, “but in my branch the thefts do not
amount to anything worth speaking about, and even if they’d steal much more, I
would still prefer the open shelf.”

There was one other problem that some associated with the
open shelf system—the transfer of communicable disease.On November 11, 1897 Dr. John S. Billings,
the director of the New York Public Library spoke in the Jackson Square Library
regarding “The Disinfection of Books.” Among his comments he said “At an
investigation made by the State Board in Iowa three years ago it was found that
six cases of scarlet fever were undoubtedly communicated through circulating
library books.Other diseases may be
communicated in the same way.There is
not much danger o this from the edges of cards, although they are foul and
filthy, and undoubtedly filled with bacteria.”

Dr. Billings presented the problem of disinfecting
books.Heat could not be used, since
sufficient heat would destroy the bindings and pages; and applying chemicals
was equally counter-productive.“We
cannot apply a solution of corrosive sublimate or zinc chloride.The fumes of burning sulphur are both
inadequate and undesireable.”

Instead he suggested placing the contaminated book under a
bell jar with a saucer of formaline.Although apparently effective it was a labor- and time-consuming process.Nevertheless, nearly a decade later the fears
of Dr. Billings would manifest themselves at the Jackson Square Library. The janitor and his family lived in the
building and in January 1908 his son fell ill with scarlet fever.

The library was shut down indefinitely.When asked how long the building would be
closed, Dr. Billings told reporters “That depends on the physician in charge of
the case.As soon as he orders the
patient removed the building will be fumigated and opened.”The New-York Tribune sympathized with the
neighborhood readers.“In the mean time
the book lovers who patronize that institution will have to walk a half-mile or
more to the nearest branches of the New York Library, on Leroy and West 23d
streets.”

A few years earlier, in 1904, William Howe Tolman in his “The
Better New York” praised the Jackson Square Library.“It circulates about 126,00 volumes a year,
and its cheerful reading room is filled day and evening with more than a
hundred readers.An interesting feature
to be noticed upon entering the main library is the glass-covered cases against
the wall, where are placed clippings from the illustrated papers of the day,
depicting subjects which are interesting to people of New York at the
time.This is done weekly to create
interest in current events, and after looking at the pictures anyone can
consult the librarians as to proper reading in connection with each
subject.To help the musically inclined
in the study of operas presented at the Metropolitan Opera House during the
season, scores are lent for a period of three days each.”

The effectiveness of the library was in part enough to
prompt a Department of Finance investigative committee to push for
discontinuance of city support of a nearby recreation center.That same year it reported “As to the library
feature, there is no reason whatever for its existence in this centre, as the
Jackson Square Branch of the New York Public Library…is in the same block and
meets all the needs of the community in this respect.This library is open in the evening until 9 o’clock
and is well patronized by the young people.”

By the Great Depression the Library had lost its ornamental weathervane -- photograph NYPL Collection

The innovative programs, like the current events boards,
continued throughout first half of the 20th century.Art displays were a regular event.In 1951 there were an exhibition of drawings
of pre-war Korea by a young Korean student and artist, Sam-Kih Min; and another
of artwork by Turkish school children.In the 1950s “story-hour” entranced children as story books were read
aloud.

The library building gained a replacement weather vane in the renovations.

Then in 1961 in order to save the marvelous Jefferson
Market Courthouse, plans were laid restore and convert that building to a library.While the proposal would save the threatened
landmark, it would mark the end of the line for the Jackson Square
Library.Richard Morris Hunt’s Dutch
fantasy sat empty until artist Robert Delford Brown purchased it in 1967 for
$125,000 as his residence and headquarters for his First National Church of the
Exquisite Panic, Inc.In 1970 an
interior renovation by Paul Marvin Rudolph, among the world’s preeminent modernist
architects, was completed. “The AIA
Guide to New York City” said of the completed project, “Brown and Rudolph’s
conversion was a thoughtful, subtle endeavor, carving light-filled spaces from
the dark masonry rooms within the old library.”

The New York Times was less appreciative.Nancy Hass, thirty years later on March 2,
2000, said “The formal front doors and a chunk of the ground floor had been
hacked away in a renovation of shocking proportions.In their place was a rubble-strewn gated
courtyard that dropped off sharply in the center, where a metal stairway led to
an exposed basement.The house seemed to
cantilever precariously above the sidewalk.”

Brown affixed a plaque to the façade “The Great Building
Crack-Up.”Inside, Rudolph’s interiors
reflected his genius at melding light and lines into spacial geometry and
visual cohesion.(Nancy Hass preferred
the term “zany pad.”)

It would not last all that long, however.Around 1995 television writer Tom Fontana discovered
and purchased the now-available building.Having paid about just under $2 million for the structure, he then nearly
doubled the cost by having Paul Rudolph’s work obliterated.New York Magazine, in 1997, called the
process “de-geniusing it.”

The vaulted glass ceiling, seen above in the Adult Reading Room, was painting over during WWII. Bentley painstakingly removed the paint and restored the ceiling. photo NYPL Collection

Fontana, who told The Times “the place was ridiculous,”
commissioned architect Ron Bentley to redesign the interiors. In the annihilation of the Rudolph
design, Bentley fashioned an upscale single family residence on
the two upper floors.Fontana’s offices
were installed in the lower two stories where Rudolph’s single surviving feature, the
entrance, remains.

2 comments:

"It was the sixth Carnegie funded library to open in America and the very first to have the new revolutionary policy of open or self-service shelves. The first five libraries to open in America, as well as the seventh, Carnegie Library of Homestead, which opened 6 months after Lawrenceville, were originally closed stack libraries where a clerk was needed to fetch books for the patrons. The eighth to open in America, the West End Branch of the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, opened January 31, 1899, would also have open stacks."

Your language is nearly correct - in implementing an innovation...but the idea came from Andrew Carnegie....Mr.Library builder himself, always keen to improve processes..whether it be steel/iron mfg, philanthropy, or getting books to read...so to say it was "unheard of" perhaps is incorrect unless the idea simultaneously came to several people...which is possible too.

Mr.Carnegie and George were friends as well...so perhaps that is how the idea spread too.